


As the Shadow Follows the Form

by Kiraynn



Category: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TV 2003), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - All Media Types
Genre: Raph and Leo need to just talk sometimes, Sibling Love, Splinter understands, short scenes of slight violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-21
Updated: 2015-02-21
Packaged: 2018-03-14 00:46:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,734
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3402269
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kiraynn/pseuds/Kiraynn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Yin and Yang: two opposite forces that both stand on their own, as well as need each other to exist in the world. One cannot be, unless the other is there somewhere keeping it just where it belongs.</p>
            </blockquote>





	As the Shadow Follows the Form

**Author's Note:**

> They were mine last night! Oh wait, that was a dream.

Although Splinter only met his children after their little bodies tumbled down the sewer drain, sticky and wet with the rain water and green goo that shattered on them upon impact with the cold concrete of the undergrown world, he could easily picture them when they were just eggs. Huddled together after leaving their mother, two of them would be closer than the others, leaning towards and yet aimed away from each other. Twins in spirit instead of body.

After the fateful day of their and the rat’s mutation, those two particular turtles continued to show such closeness. Where one wandered off the other would follow, even if at times he was perhaps reluctant to do so. 

When they had reached the age of ten, Splinter allowed them out of the Lair itself into the sewer tunnels that surrounded their home, but no further. Raphael had turned into a wanderer. He was eager to be the first to explore, the first to see, smell, and experience. As if he sensed that his brother needed someone to temper him, Leonardo would accompany him even if Donatello and Michelangelo refused to follow along. 

Donnie was more interested in the bits and pieces of toys Splinter would find, forcing them together to either fix them or make new things to play with. Mikey, wanting to be the first to use them, would usually be found watching over the olive green turtle’s shoulder with an eager bounce and an excited flail. (“Gimme, gimme!”)

Letting them out on their own made Splinter worry terribly, but it made him feel a little more at ease that Leo would drop whatever he was doing to follow his brother. Splinter had faith that Leo would keep Raph from trouble, and that Raph would protect Leo from harm. 

More often than not, Leo was the one to enter the Lair first after such outings, fond exasperation on his face while Raph trudged along behind him, body slumped with both annoyance and contrite in equal measures.

As they aged even more, Splinter was forced to make a choice. Although all of his sons would make good leaders given a chance (yes, even Michelangelo if he could get him to focus for more than five minutes), Splinter knew that as ‘eldest’, Leo had a natural skill for the lead role. He knew how to encourage Donnie, calm Mikey, and temper Raph to some extent. 

Although Raph was at first shocked, then angry and frustrated that he was not the one chosen, he forced himself to work all the harder for it. The two turtles began to compete in every training exercise so that they could be equally matched. 

Raphael claimed it was because he wanted to be better than Leonardo, but Splinter was not fooled. He knew that in his heart, Raphael felt the need his twin required of him; the need for a Second-in-Command, a shadow at his back. 

Unfortunately, over time Raphael’s own feelings twisted into resentment when Leonardo proved capable of taking care of himself. The thin line that separated them yet kept them together had begun to fray, sending them further away from each other.

Raphael’s rebellion had grown into frightening levels. He thought himself better, and in his determination to prove that, he nearly cost himself everything instead.

“Raphael, fall back!” Leo shouted across the rooftop, barely heard over the cries, weapons clashing, and seas of bodies that were the sounds and sights of battle.

He and his brothers were surrounded by Foot Soldiers. They had been fighting for several hours already, bodies wounded, tired and worn. For every cluster of enemies they took down, more would come at them. Fatigue had started to wear the turtles thin and if they didn’t get out of there, they would not survive.

Even from their distance, Leo could see the stiffening tell of Raphael’s body. He had heard the order, but he would not obey.

With a loud, overly-frustrated curse, Leo quickly cut down the black-clad ninja in front of him and catapulted himself over the fallen human. He shoved his body through the next bunch like a bowling ball through pins, the momentum sending them back into the group that Donnie and Mikey were fighting and momentarily taking them out of commission.

“Go!” he urged his youngest brothers as he passed by, confident that at least they would listen to him. “We’ll be right behind you!”

By the time Leo made it to Raph’s side, his hotheaded sibling was bloody and barely upright, but as though he felt the need to prove a point, he would not stop. Leo guided his shell against the other teen’s, protecting his back as they found themselves in the center of the hurricane.

“I don’t need your fucking help, Leo!” Raph snarled over his shoulder. “I can take them myself!”

“No you can’t! None of us can!” Leo shouted back. “That’s why we have to go!”

“You go! I don’t run from anyone!”

“Damn it, Raph! Your need to prove yourself is going to get one of us killed!”

Raph gave a short, bitter laugh. He swung his arm in a short, quick arch, burying one of his sai into the chest of the nearest Foot Soldier. “Maybe it’ll be you, eh?” he taunted. “Can’t nag me if you’re dead!”

Donnie and Mikey had managed to break free of their attackers and make it to the side of the roof. They turned to locate their eldest siblings when Mikey caught a flash of silver.

“No! Raph, look out!” he shouted in alarm.

It felt like slow motion as Raph began to turn, amber eyes catching sight of the blade coming towards him too quickly to dodge. He was shoved sideways so violently he hit the rooftop in amid spray of blood.

Raphael heard his siblings yelling as he lay sprawled there, but their voices sounded muffled and far away like he was under water. His heart pounded in his ears, muscles tight and eyes wide in horrified shock.

Time seemed to slow. 

In front of him, a shield to the end, Leo dropped to his knees like a marionette whose wires had been severed. His katana slipped from lax fingers as his body swayed, then tipped over. Raph scrambled up in time to catch him, body marred with the blood, hot and sticky that was pouring out around the sword that protruded from his unprotected side.

“NO!”

Everything faded into darkness around them. Raph no longer heard the Foot Soldiers, Donnie and Mikey, or the sound of his own cries. All he could see was Leo, his twin and best friend, bleeding to death in his arms. 

Their words from only moments before rang in his head: 

_“Damn it, Raphael! Your need to prove yourself is going to get one of us killed!”_

_“Maybe it’ll be you, eh? Can’t nag me if you’re dead!”_

“No!” Raph cried again. “Fuck! No, Leo, please! I didn't mean it!”

With Leo down, it was like Mikey and Donnie had lost two of their brothers. Raph was immobile, even as the Foot Soldiers moved to bear down on them. With all four of their deaths on the horizon if they didn’t leave, Mikey unleashed a number of smoke pellets. 

With only seconds, the two younger turtles managed to pull Leo from Raph’s arms and get the two of them off of the roof and into the safety of a nearby sewer in the alley below.

 

>

 

Raph felt completely numb. 

Donnie and April worked desperately for hours, fighting to save Leo’s life. Splinter and Mikey helped best they could, making sure the two had all the supplies they needed, fresh water, and disinfectants. 

If at any time, someone tried to speak to Raph he didn’t hear it. All he could do was sit on the floor of the Lair just inside the entrance, eyes blurry as tears ran rivers down his face. It was his entire fault.

_“Can’t nag me if you’re dead!”_

He’d said a horrible, cruel thing. And the worst part was that he’d meant it. For one brief, sick moment, he almost wanted Leo to die. He wanted the freedom to live his life how he wanted, without Big Brother’s disapproval at every step.

Now that his wish, however short, had begun to come true, Raph wished that the blade had found its mark in him instead as it was meant to. He was a horrible brother, and Leo didn’t deserve to have to suffer because of him.

“We removed the blade and closed his wound,” Donnie told Raph hours later, a repeat on what he’d already explained to everyone else. But Raph hadn’t been in the lab to hear it, hadn’t moved, so Donnie had come to him. He touched Raph’s wrist, carefully avoiding the dried blood on his skin. “There’s still a real threat of infection, I won’t lie about that, but April and I are optimistic. Leo’s a fighter, Raph, he’s going to make it through this.” 

Raph was terrified to hope. 

He’d only moved to take up residence in the lab on a chair next to the lone cot. The soft yellow of his plastron as well as his arms were still stained a dark, rusty red. He still hadn’t even washed the dried blood off even after Donnie talked to him, too afraid to take his attention from his eldest brother for more than a moment.

He raised his eyes to the slack face in front of him. The smell of the antiseptic was making him feel sick. It drove home the fact that it was his purely selfish actions that led to that. His heart ached so painfully, it felt like he really had been the one stabbed through.

“Why, Leo?” he mumbled hoarsely, voice thick with emotional pain. “Why would you do that for me? Well, I know why,” he amended with a small, bitter choke of a laugh. “We’re brothers. We’re a team. But why do I need you more than you need me?”

“Is that what you believe, my son?”

Raphael closed his eyes tight, and gave a terse nod as Splinter shuffled over to stand beside him. “It’s always been that way,” he admitted to the aged rat. “Leo’s always been one step ahead of me. One ounce better than me. I feel like all I do is chase after him trying to keep up.”

“Your brother doesn’t believe himself better.” Splinter placed his hand on Raph’s strong, broad shoulder. “He went so far and so quickly, because he knew that you would always be right beside him. Not behind him. If he didn’t push himself further, then he was afraid he would drag you down with him.”

Raph shook his head. “That doesn’t make sense, Master Splinter. We’re not attached. Leo would keep advancing without me, just like he has been the whole damn time.”

That hostility was back; a familiarity he desperately clung to even as he hated himself for doing it. 

“Without you?” Splinter repeated in surprise. “No, my son. He has been _with_ you. Tell me, without the constant competition between the two of you, do you think either yourself or Leonardo would have advanced so far in Ninjitsu?”

“I wouldn’t,” Raph answered without hesitation. He pushed himself harder because of Leo. He just wasn’t sure he believed that Leo did the same.

“You claim that you and Leonardo are not attached, and while that’s true physically, mentally and spiritually the two of you are halves of the same whole.” Splinter gave Raph’s shoulder another squeeze, then dropped his hand. “Clean up, have some food and rest, and think about what I said. Your brother will be fine.”

Not long after Splinter left, Donnie came into the lab. “You heard what Master Splinter said,” the olive green turtle stated. Though his words were stern, Donnie’s eyes were soft and understanding. “Out.”

With one last look at Leo, Raph rose to his feet and reluctantly left the lab. He entered the kitchen after his shower to find Mikey had made him a sandwich. The normally energetic turtle didn’t say anything; just walked up to Raph, gave him a tight hug, then disappeared out of the room. 

Raph ate his food mechanically without even really tasting it. He had been told to rest after, but his bedroom seemed too far away. What if something happened to Leo and they needed him? So instead, he made himself as comfortable as possible on their old, lumpy and scotch-taped sofa and fell to sleep.

The Lair was dark when Raphael awoke several hours later. He climbed to his feet with a wince, body aching from the poor support from the sofa, and shuffled his way into the lab. The glow from Donnie’s computer screen cast a white glow in the room, giving Leo’s prone body a ghostly look.

Raph’s heart pounded against his chest as he rushed over. He pressed two fingers to the side of Leo’s neck, breath held as he desperately attempted to find a pulse. The steady beat beneath his touch, alive and healthy, immediately calmed him down.

“Thank you,” he murmured to no one, slumping down on the chair beside the cot.

“…shouldn’t you be sleeping?”

Raph’s head snapped up, eyes wide when he found Leo weakly staring at him with half-lidded eyes. Relief and anger flooded his system equally, and without even really thinking about it, Raph leapt to his feet.

“You fucking idiot!” he snarled. “How could you do that?! That blow was meant for me, you selfish, self-absorbed shithead! You and your hero complex! You’re not better than me!”

He wanted see that familiar fire in Leo’s eyes as he yelled back. He waited his brother to rise to his bait just like before. But all Leo did was look at him.

“Damn it, say something!” Raph demanded desperately. “Tell me you’re a better leader, a better brother! Tell me I don’t listen, that I’m hotheaded and rash and I take too many risks! Tell me I’m going to get myself killed one day! Tell me--”

“I love you.”

Raph froze. “W-what?”

“I love you,” Leo repeated. “You’re strong, brave, and courageous. Your skills are unmatched. You care for all of us so much that you’re the first one at our sides if we’re hurt. You push yourself harder in order to be everything we need you to be both in battle, and as a brother. If I had died up there on that roof, you would have stepped up and taken lead of Mikey and Donnie with all the capability, skill, and protective love that you possess in that big, soft heart of yours. Raphael, you’re everything I’ve ever wanted to be.” Leo smiled, tears in his eyes. “I’m proud of you, little brother.”

Raph had begun to tremble during the speech, and by the end of it he released a sob and carefully slid his arms around Leo’s shoulders. “Don’t you ever do that to me again.”

“I can’t promise that.”

Indignant, Raph lifted this head, ready to shout again, but stopped short as he looked down at the other turtle. The tears were running down Leo’s face now, but the smile, so full of affection, was still on his face. 

“I will do anything for you, Raph. Just like I would for Mikey and Donnie. I would give my life in a heartbeat, because it’s not mine. Not really. My life is only for all of you. I am the body and mind, but the three of you are my heart and soul. Especially you.”

Raph moved one hand and cupped Leo’s cheek. “Kage no katachi ni shitago ga gotoshi,” he murmured, a rare but welcome softness in his eyes. It was an expression he hadn’t given his elder brother since their childhood.

_As the shadow follows the form._

“Yes,” Leo smiled tenderly at the proverb, “we’re inseparable, you and I. It’s time we go back to realizing that. But there’s one difference, Raph. You are not a shadow at my back, and you never were. You, little brother, have always been an equal at my side. That’s the only place I will have you.”

Raph’s chuckle that time was without bitterness, or resentment, but instead was filled with a newfound hope. “I think I can do that.”


End file.
